


Dresses and Dramas

by TheAnimangaGirl



Series: The Amell Chronicles [18]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types
Genre: Alcohol, F/M, Just wanted Amell a bit drunk, Kirkwall (Dragon Age), One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-21
Updated: 2017-07-21
Packaged: 2018-12-05 03:24:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,426
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11569293
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheAnimangaGirl/pseuds/TheAnimangaGirl
Summary: Lady Ceville is bad, and petty, also Amell is drunk





	1. Dresses

“An then Lady Ceville was all, ‘Oh  Chancellor I didn’t notice you there’ and now I have my favorite dress ruined, what a night!”

It was odd to see the mighty Hero of Ferelden in her smallclothes bumbling in her small clothes in her barely used bed. The castle staff knew they had to maintain the room, but for them was easy as it was an easy assignment, hardly used. When the Chancellor was in Denerim she shared the King’s room. A fact that long had worn its novelty and now it was routine. That’s likely why Viola the elven maid assigned to that very room, almost had a heart attack when she entered the supposedly empty room to find one of the most important woman of Ferelden, reeking of alcohol playin with military markers as if they were dolls.

“Andraste’s sacred crown!”

“Oh, hi” said the Chancellor with a big goofy smile “You must be the one who dusts my room when I am not here, a pleasure!”

“I...ah...my Lady…”

“Oh right, I am Arlessa I almost forgot, don’t you people get confused? Sometimes having to call me Commander or Chancellor or Arlessa?”

“We got the chart you made, my lady”

“I did a chart? Wow I am more boring than expected”

Boring? Thought Viola, the woman who killed Darkspawn as a routine thought she was boring? Something was not fitting in this picture.

“My Lady, umm, may I….”

“Come in? Sure sure be my guest, drinking alone is too depressing anyway”

The maid left her candle on the little table by the door, now that she was it, the whole room was very illuminated, more than the usual fireplace would. She looked at the ceiling, only to see little yellow wisps just twirling in the ceiling. 

“Nice isn’t it?”

“I admit I’ve never seen this kind of magic”

“A little trick I’ve been working on”

“Impresive”

The Arlessa took the bottle and gave it a big drink.

“My Lady, if I may?”

“Speak your mind my elven friend!”

“Why are you here, drinking , and alone… there are a lot of nobles downstairs, including the King”

“Maybe I’ll tell you, if you tell me why are you checking my room at this hour”

Viola gave an easy laugh “That does have a simple explanation, one of the guards told me he heard someone coming to this room, I assumed it was a or guest, or rather  guests, so I came to clean whatever mess they might have left behind”

“That...That does make sense, blood and damnation”

“May I fetch you a robe, my lady?”

“Yeah yeah, is not like anyone wants to see me in my small clothes”

Viola was very tempted to say at least ten names of people who would kill to see her in her small clothes but bite her tongue, last she needed was the  _ King  _ to find out and have a mass execution.

She gave the mostly naked Warden a warm purple robe. Amell put it on , but left it open, so it wasn’t really covering much.

“See, I was downstair, being a good court member, when Lady Ceville ‘accidentally’ threw her cup of wine on my dress, and you know what happened?”

“You set her on fire?” asked Viola, exited at the prospect of getting rid of Lady Ceville 

“If only” she gave another big drink to the bottle, was that  _ Dwarven ale?  _ “No, she and Lady Laurel began laughing , and then I laughed too, because what else was I going to do? So I said I was heading upstairs to change, then the music started and that evil Ceville had the gall to start dancing with the King, so I came upstairs as fast as I could only to find….I don’t have a single formal dress here, so I took a bottle and began drinking myself stupid.”

“That’s impossible” said Viola with a confused tone “I personally checked your room two nights ago, before you arrived, there were at least five formal dresses, including the purple commissioned one, the one with silverite buttons.”

Amell rose from the bed and walked unevenly to the closet, when she opened Viola let a out a gasp. Inside the closet instead of dresses, was...nothing, the closet was devoid of dresses, the shoes were there, so did the jewelry and capes, but not a single formal dress. Instead there was a peasant skirt and blouse, magical robes, clearly from the Kirkwall circle as they had the city of chains insignia in the belt and….was that a periwinkle dress from the Pearl? 

“Check and Mate” said the Warden closing the door angrily “That snake knew exactly what she was doing, and I will not be able to prove anything….”she gave another big drink “Cheers for me”

“I could get you…”

“No” she said in a serious tone “All my dresses are commissioned, Viola, they all bear either Amaranthine insignia or the Grey Warden’s one, if not, they have Ferelden’s coat of arms, if I show up with a borrowed dress, no it will not be proper”

“Perhaps the King…”

“I don’t want to bother Alistair with this sort of things”

“I am sure his Majesty wouldn’t want to see you like this”

And just with that the mighty hero of Ferelden began sobbing. Viola having children herself immediatly oppened her arms to the weeping lady.Said Lady began saying incoherencies about Architects, about the Deep Roads, something about a ‘Mother’ , something about a cat. Viola just rubbed circles in her back as she did when her daughter was distraught because of some boy. It did however first dawned on how young the hero of Ferelden was,  she heard that she was eighteen when the Wardens made their stand in Ostagar, that was roughly three years ago. Both she and the King were almost children and already had huge responsibilities. Viola then steeled her resolve.

Step 1 Get the King her to console the Chancellor even if she had to drag him by the ear

Step 2 Not get executed for dragging the King by the ear

Step 3 Find a way to get back at Lady Ceville for this

The mission would easily end in disaster, but thinking back, didn’t Caroline the cook knew about some f _ riends _ ?

.-.-.-.-

 

Viola excused herself leaving a much calmer but still very awake and very drunk Hero of Ferelden in her room. Quietly as any elf could do she passed to the kitchens where Caroline was instruction some of the aids in closing the kitchen and storing or taking everything home. Caroline was surface dwarf, she had a reputation of being one of the best cooks in Denerim and her determination earned her a place among the permanent staff on Denerim’s palace since King Cailan’s reign. Some stories said she had been Carta, others that she was a lost princess from a far away dwarven Kingdom, but there was one thing you didn’t doubt. You did not messed with Caroline Yuter. Ever.

“Ah Viola” said the blonde dwarf “ I was sure you would be in bed by now, did you managed to fix whatever it was that needed fixing?”

Viola shook her head, anger betraying her neutral face.

“Hey hey, what’s going on? Did someone did something to you? Because I am ready to make heads roll!”

“NO, no, it’s not me”

Viola explained the situation which only managed to make the dwarf angrier. 

“Just who do they think they are? They obviously weren’t here in the Battle of Denerim, I saw he and her party as we were evacuating the city, the most determined human I’ve seen”

“Can you friends, help?”

“Oh absolutely, pranking nobles is part of the oath”

“You have an oath?”

“Of course not, but sounds cool to say it”

“So what do we do now, as I heard the King is being mobbed as we speak”

“I believe the King to be the sort of man to leave his own coronation if that meant tying the shoe of his lady.”

“So you have a plan?”

“Yes, we give him a message only he could understand, I can give it to James the server, who can give it to Thomas the Guard , who can give it to Yelan the Announcer, who can give it to Paola the assistant secretary who can give it to Corin, the King’s secretary, who can give it to the King”

“Tha’t...oddly specific, but what sort of message can we give them so it won’t get intercepted?”

“Do you remember the Song of the Hero, the ballad by the Nightingale?”

“Yeah”

“I know as a fact both his majesty and the Chancellor know it by heart.”

“Alright I think I can see where this is going.”

.-.-.-.

_ “The sword alone in her scabbard, yearning for shield all surrounded by dwarven drink” _

 

The message was really one of the strangest thing Corin had ever read in his life. It almost seemed like butchered poem, or a spell, but Paola had told him that it was important for the King to read that as soon as he was able. Luck would have it the king was resting on the high chair overseeing the dance room. After all he had all  but being ambushed by nobles.

“Your Majesty?”

“Yes Corin, what is it?” he said drinking from a bubbling glass. Maker he was tired. 

“Pardon me for interrupting you , you majesty, but I was told to give you this message”

The King looked at the scrap of paper curiously. “I’ll bite,” he said unfolding the piece of paper. He read it once, then twice.

“Who gave you this?” he asked suddenly serious

“Paola, my assistant”

“Is she trustworthy?”

“Very much your Majesty, the message was sent thru a lot of people to ensure it would reach you”

“I see” he said pursing his lips. “I am going to ‘disappear’ for a moment, if I am not back in twenty minutes, end the party, say I got tired or something”

“Yes your Majesty”

He walked stealth as he could to a lateral entrance of the hall. Slowly he walked toward the restricted part of the palace, to the second floor. The family quarters, when he heard an unmistakable off-key voice.

 

“Oh, that dog, he guards Andraste   
Without arrogance or fear,   
Only asking of his mistress   
Just a scratch behind the ears.”

 

He saw two guard containing their laughs at the end of the hallway, said guards removed the smile from their face the moment the King made eye contact with them. Well eye contact is too vague, the correct word would be glare-until-you-are-sure-said-guards-fear-for-banishment. He knocked the door.

“Chancellor?”

“Whoooose there?”

Uh-Oh he recognized that tone. Like the note said she was drinking, very heavily apparently. Just what on Thedas had happened?

“Lady Amell, I am coming in”

“Oh you can come  _ in”  _ she laughed and Alistair feel the colors rose from his shoulders to his hairline. One of the guards obviously with a very small sense of self preservation betrayed his silence with a giggle. The king looked at the offending guard with such glare that the guard just marched solwly as a deer does when confronted by a wolf. The remaining guard just saluted and made the international sign of silence, Indicating he was not about to be as dumb as his companion. With that settled down, he entered the room.

The Chancellor’s room was, what was previously knows as the Consort’s room. The Royal bedroom was the room of the reigning monarch, the Consort room was, well, the name said it. However it was a regular occurrence that the monarch and their consort shared the royal bedroom. Queen Rowan and Anora had hardly used the room during their reign if palace gossip was to be believed. Only when situation demanded it the consort room was ever used. When Amell was in Denerim she stayed with him in the Royal bedroom and she used the room as a glorified dress room or office.  The few times they had really big fights she had stubbornly stayed in her own room, it also happened when he was out of Denerim and she was left in charge. She used her own room to reassure the panicking Chantry Mothers that a mage had not in fact became the queen of Ferelden.

Appearances mattered.

So when he entered the room he didn’t expected to see the Hero of Ferelden in her smallclothes singing Andraste’s Mabari in that delightful completely off key voice of hers. What had Oghren told him once? That love had not made him blind, it had made him deaf.

“Amell, what’s going on?” he asked allowing just enough surprise to color his voice.

His voice apparently made her sober up, just a bit. The easygoing smile from his face vanished and suddenly it was as if nothing was wrong….with the exception of her lack of clothing and her slurred speech.

“Oh, Alistair, I mean your majesty I-I uh....” she began to rub her forearms. “Wha-what are you doing here?”

“What am  _ I _ doing here?” he asked looking around the somewhat trashed room “What are you doing here, we had a ball downstairs, remember?”

“Ah yes”

“So?”

“I can’t go”

“Why not?”

“I-I….I don’t want to tell you”

“Oh” he asked carefully , inspecting the room, it was certainly smaller than  _ their  _ room , but it wasn’t by any means small place. It had a balcony that faced towards the gardens several piece of exquisite but sturdy furniture and an ample armoire. Chests and armor stands were a must for the owner of the room. 

He sat on the bed beside her.

“Hey love”

“Hey”

“Now will you tell me?”

“No”

“Stubborn as always” he said scratching his chin

“I am not stubborn, you are the stubborn”

“My love, I can say without hesitation that you are one of the most stubborn woman in Thedas, and for that I thank the Maker every day”

She remained silent for a moment “I want a doll”

“A doll?” he asked taken aback for the sudden change of topic

“Yes yes, like the one I had when I was a kid, what was her name, ah yes Alexandra, did I ever told you about Alexandra?”

“I...I don’t think so, no”  childhood was a topic they both were very hesitant to approach. It was a painful topic. More for him than her , he suspected. The story of the bastard orphan sleeping with dogs got more depressing as it was told over and over. She however was very hesitant when talking about her own childhood, claiming blessed ignorance of her time before the Circle. Either she was remembering because she was this drunk, or she was saying it because she had lost all inhibition.

“It was a miniature me, she went everywhere I went , we dressed the same and all, there was this….this boy that liked to hide her. Who was he, anyway?”

“What happened to her, to Alexandra?”

“Templars, templar took her away, threw her somewhere and forgot about her”

That didn’t seemed like the Circle Amell had always described. She always talked about Kinloch Hold as a very relaxed and tolerant Circle. What kind of monster takes a child’s toy?

“Are we still talking about the doll?”

“No...you don’t forget the first time when you feel real hunger, the kind of hunger that you feel days afterwards”

The talk wasn’t make a lot of sense, mabe he was drunker than he thought?

“It was cold, I kept crying for my mother, that’s why they didn’t feed me, then one templar cut me and took blood, I just kept crying, he hit me” she traced an almost invisible line behind her ear, how had he never noticed?  “I thought I was going to be in the darkness forever, but one day they just took me and placed me on a boat with another templar, have I ever told you I get seasick?”

“You haven’t mentioned…”

“Then I meet Irving, and he was nice, he fed me and Gregoir didn’t hit me...I forgot about the other Templar, I forced myself to forget, to forget everything before Irving, the other mages told me it was best to forget, who would want to remember the Gallows anyway?”

The Gallows? Kirkwall? Amell was from Kirkwall? She had always claimed she didn’t knew much of her past, was she lying or did being drunk really loosened some blockages?.

“Amell, you are talking about Kirkwall, you are from Kirkwall?”

“Kirkwall, yes, Amaranthine trades with Kirkwall, do you know they sent us the roses that are on the gardens? Yet a bastard high up was targeting my ships, but don’t worry one of my agents fixed it”

“But that wasn’t what I…”

“Roses roses, we should name a Mabari Roses”

“I...yes dear we should do that”

“Want to know why I didn’t went down?

“I...yes that would be good”

She gave a very drunk giggle. And stood up to the closet and oppened the the two doors with force. Alistair at first didn’t saw anything wrong with the contents, he then walked beside his fellow Warden. Then it clicked.

“Call me drunk, but wasn’t there supposed to be dresses in here, like a lot?”

“Yup” she said giving a big drink to the dwarven ale “And there are none, so unless you want me downstairs in smallclothes…”

“What? Of course not!”

“Why not? I have a nice body, didn’t you saw...what’s his name...the third cousin of the bald bann ogling me all over? Maker I just wanted to send him a walking bomb when he kissed my hand end tried to touch my hair….”

“Wait, what? Why didn’t you said anything?”

“Something about not disturbing you with trivialities, not worry love, I rejected his marriage proposal”

“His...his...his what?” he asked sobering up faster than Oghren had when they encountered the Archdemon in Denerim 

“Not the first one” she said placing the empty bottle in a desk 

“Not the...how come I didn’t knew about this?”

“You would get jealous if I did”

“Of course I would” he said shamelessly

“See, Eamon was right, blood and damnation”

“Eamon, as in Arl Eamon?”

“That’s the one, I don’t like him”

“You have made it abundantly clear , my dear, what did Eamon told you”

“To marry and leave you alone”

“Oh”

_ Oh  _ indeed Eamon , he thought he would have giving a break after two years, but apparently not only he had not stopped, but his constant pressure had managed to leak into Amell’s usual stone solid facade. He would need to talk with him,  _ again. _

“I miss when we were just the two of us”

“Was it ever?”

“No, but I miss spending time with you, you are always so busy King-ing”

“Just as busy as you are Arlessa-ing and Commander-ing”

“I am sorry”

“I don’t need you to apologize, I know if it were up to us we would probably only leave the room to hunt Darkspawn and the occasional play.”

“I don’t have a dress to go back downstair, someone sabotaged me”

“Who would even”

“I don’t really care, but won’t you spend the night with me, no tumbling, no crown, just like the good old days ,please Tair?”

“Your desire is my command” he said removing his cape. He was also very tired, and to sleep with her in her room gave him a calming reassurance, as if they were in their little own Thedas. One formal attire later, he was down to his silk undershirt, cotton under trousers and not much more. She on her part begrudgingly put on a short sleeved cotton shirt that was too big for her and some cotton trousers. They both climbed to the smaller bed, which forced them to huddle closer together. They seeked each other instinctively and spooned. There was something intimate about the act, to be so close together just feeling each other’s presence.

“Good night my dear”

“Goodnight my love”


	2. Epilogue: Divine Justice

Lady Ceville got an incredible upset stomach that week. Included but not reduced too, diarrhea, gases and bloatness. For some reason only her plate caused her discomfort.  On the other side all her shoes turned a noxious color yellow with black stripes and a vicious hive of wasp made its home just outside her window, that stopped her from opening her window during the summer time. She was very unhappy.

**Author's Note:**

> Honestly I based Amell drunken episode a bit to mine when I was younger. I never forgot what happened during my patrying nights (Blessing or curse?). Anyway, I often hit a plateu of Drunkness-Sanity when I could begin to remember things I had blocked or plain forgotten. Like the periodic table. Unlike me however Amell forgets what she says when she get in her plateu.
> 
> -.-.-.-.-
> 
> I had this draft forever in my Drive, I just needed to get over with it.


End file.
